George Lucas Still Owes Me Money

I'm making a little list of film makers who riped me off. I honestly believe that I'm owed a refund for particularly bad movies. Topping the list is Woody Allen. He owes me $8 and one night of my life for having to sit through Curse of the Jape Scorpion. That film is inexcusable.

George Lucas owes me the cost of addmission for Phantom Menance and Attack of the Clones. Those were bad, bad movies. The newest one was not bad. It wasn't good, but not bad. We'll call that a draw but Lucas still owes me sixteen bucks!

Case Histoies

It seems a literary blog site has names Kate Atkinson's Case Histories as it's book of the month. I really admire Atkinson's writing and her latest has an eerie quality to it that's very unsettling.

It just broke, honestly!

Funny how things work out. Just last week I said to Andy, "I think I'd like a digital camera."

"You just has a birthday! Why didn't you tell me a month ago?"

"Just occured to me. Besides, I can wait to Christmas."

Then Saturday, at a lovely Memorial Day cook-out, my camera breaks. The film rewinds. The thing shuts down, and the batteries were good, I swear. I pop in fresh batteries, nothing. It won't turn on, nothing. Andy and a small group of people were standing around at the time because I was tying to get a good photo of everyone, so I have plenty of witnesses who swear that I DID NOT break the camera.

I pass the camera around. Everyone has a chance to fiddle with it and everyone agrees, it's dead. Passed on. Has ceased to be.

Andy says, "I told everyone at work that I was buying a digital camera this weekend," with that knowing smirk of his.

"It was an accident!"

"Uh-huh."

Sunday I cruised the internets, looking for my camera, and came across this guy. It's pretty cool, too. Fancy but not too fancy and easy enough for me to use without cursing at it, which is important.

Again, following Jenny's lead

:: how jedi are you? ::


Cool.

29

It seems I have been remiss in mentioning my birthday. It was very nice. Andy left out my present on the table the night before, just to taunt me. It was smallish, like a book, but he kept saying he got me an adventure. I couldn't stand the anticipation!

The next morning, I torn into it, revealing a little red journal and gift certificates to my favorite clothing store and a videogame store. Cool.

After a hard day of me parading around saying I could possibly answer the phone or do any paperwork because it was my birthday, Andy took me out to dinner, the food was average. But the Rasberry Martini I ordered was huge! Clearly it was some sort of novelty glass as it was twice the size of a regular martini glass. But I drank it, no complaints here.

After dinner, Andy took me out for a water ice. We're standing in line at the Dairy Delight (corny name, I know) and there's an entire little league team in front of us. One kid, #8, kept throwing his hat in the air and shouting "Orange Sherbert!" I meanwhile, was a little tipsy and felt the need to tell people it was my birthday. When it comes down to it, I'm a cheap drunk.

Grandma called when I got home. All the conversation I was good for was "martinis and ice cream." Now she thinks I'm a lush.

And the following Saturday I went to the mall and spent all those loverly gift ertificates. I got the game, Psychonauts, which is so cool!!!

Sunday, the Natalies and Delmar held a Mel-B-Que, to celebrate my slow approach to 30. The tree in the back yard was decorated with a half dozen little violet and deep purple packages hanging from the branches. I said, "You got me a Pennsylvania Present Tree for my birthday? Cool!"

And the moral of the story is that everything is cool on your birthday.

My Continuing Adventures in Russian Cuisine

I love food. And I'm all for trying new, exotic dishes. I'm all for ordering something called Thousand Year Bread because it sound cool. But I swear, there are somethings I know are nasty just by looking at 'em.

I'm at a Russian client's house this afternoon. Usually an appointment with a Russian involves tea, etc and I've come to accept that there is no way for me to avoid this. I eat a light lunch and get on with it.

So I was offered tea, accepted and was served a bowl of "groscha" with the tea. Apparently this is dish of cold chicken, hard boiled eggs, dill, green stuff, topped with sour cream. It didn't look bad. Then the woman poured some cold brown liquid all over it. Not merely enough for a dressing, enough to turn the bowl into soup.

And then brown stuff...It was like beer, but maltier and more fermented and vaguely sweet, like a prehistoric beer that could jump you in an alley and take all your money.

So I guess groscha (only my phonetic spelling)is beer soup. I was told this dish is served on warm summer days.

And you know how good I am at acting. I couldn't take two polite sips befor everyone knew it "was not for me." I didn't want to be rude but I couldn't even force myself to choke the beer soup down. Easily one of the grossiest culinary things to cross my path ever.

Which Sci-Fi author are you?

I am: Gregory Benford A master literary stylist who is also a working scientist.

Which science fiction writer are you?

Which is funny, because the site says that Benford once took the test and it told him he was Arthur C. clark. Ha!

And as much I think Benford is a big gas bag, I see how my writing style is similar.

Amazing Linguistic Tricks

Last night, the Natalies and I went to Chicken Holiday (which is a silly name, I know, but they have good chicken) and the guy behind the countr said to me, "I tell from your accent that you spent some time in Texas."

Me, stunned, said, "Um, yeah. I spent a good bit of my childhood in Texas."

"And you were also in Kansas City."

I practically fainted. That's a dead impressive parlor trick.

I Wanna Go to the Time Travel Conference!

A student at MIT is hosting a time traveling conference on May 7, 2005. He's sending out the invitations now and anyone from the future is invited to attend, no registration necessary.

I don't think I need to repeat how much I love the idea of time travel and anything tenuously connected to it.

The Cops!

Ten minutes after my last post, the police finally arrive. Renne escorts the officer through the office, starting with the broken window. Jule and I lurk in the background because we're nosey. At the front door, the officer says, "I can't pull any prints off of this. Too many people have used it. You should have called earlier."

I thought Jule's head was going to explode. She whispers to me, "We called at 9! It's not our fault it took them two hours to get here."

Granted, in Philadelphia, the cops respond to a lot of horrible calls. No one was bleeding here so we were on the bottom of the list. We're lucky the cop fit us in before lunch.

Right now she's dusting my desk, monitor, and CPU tower. Since the doors are no good, the best chance of getting prints is off the computer the theif was planning on taking but didn't, for some reason. I wouldn't have minded (so much) if my crappy computer was gone but Jule keeps complaining about her stereo. Now she's trying to coach me into saying it was a new stereo, for insurance fraud, I guess.

My Bloody Anniversary

I wanted to write quick little story about waking up this morning and finding my present from Andy on the sofa. He said, "The cats brought this in, I have no idea what it is." And it's this set of apple green mixing bowls from Williams Sonoma that I said I liked about a month ago. And two awesome spatulas that never stain and are heat resesitant. Cool. (I guess part of being a grown up is receiving kitchen stuff and being excited about it.)

But in the process of opening the box, I gave myself a fantasic papercut right on the knuckle of my left index finger. And it bleed. And bleed.

Went to the bathroom for a bandaid (plaster) and we have none. 2 bottle of cough syrup, lots of antibacterial ointment and medical tape. So I wrapped my finger up in medical tape least I bleed my way through breakfast.

I get to work and my office is ransacked. The tower of my computer is unplugged and in the middle of the room. I thought, "Maybe there was a dead mouse behind my desk. Sure is nice of someone to clean it up."

Then I noticed that the stereo is gone. Files from the desk are scattered on the floor. Drawers opened. And, oddly, and empty cannister of antifreeeze on the floor.

I don't jump to conclusions. But then Jule said she didn't leave the office looking a pig sty and the computer from our boss's office is also gone...Crap. We were robbed. Again. The second time in two months.

After we realized that, it was obvious that other desks were ransacked. Nothing else was gone, just the stereo and computer.

And then we noticed that smashed window in the lobby, glass everywhere. And the tool marks on the front door where it was pried opened.


It's amazing how you don't notice these things when your hustling in the door at 8.28 am.

Now we're waiting for the police to show up. We called at nine, it's now 11 am. Philly cops take their time.

I can't work now. I've been told not to touch my desk because it has finger prints. Besides, I really can't focus back in that office today, knowing that a stranger was there, maliciously pawing our stuff.

Happy Birthday Clare

Happy Birthday to a great, dear, funny and tall friend who is firmly in her twenties and not where near thirty and allow me to add that this message in no way should be considered late because it's not. Sure, it's being posted on May 3rd but I knew the 1st was your birthday and only a mind explodingly painful migrane kept me from expressing sincre birthday salutations. Honest. Ask Andy.